


Anchor

by ykoriana



Series: tearing you asunder [2]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Gen, POV First Person, Spoilers, Vignette, Vulcan Mind Melds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-22
Updated: 2009-05-22
Packaged: 2019-11-03 21:19:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17885399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ykoriana/pseuds/ykoriana
Summary: Kirk ponders some after effects of his mind meld with Spock Prime.





	Anchor

**Author's Note:**

> Originally published on May 22nd 2009 on Livejournal.
> 
> I still very much like the 2009 Star Trek film, though J.J. Abrams really blew it with Into Darkness.
> 
> The opening line of this work is a deliberate misquote from the song “Hurt” by Trent Reznor.

 

 

I am someone else. I am still right here.

Sometimes it’s like a blur of _something_ out of the corner of my eye, and when I turn to face it it’s gone. Like earlier today, when I sat I the command chair and knew I’d sat there before and of course I did, but I mean _before_ and that wasn’t _me_ , that was _him_ because I look down and I see a blue uniform shirt and Commander stripes, and that was just one of the countless times that Jim ignored regulations and beamed down to the planet sur -

I blink, and when I turn around it’s gone. I glance at Spock, because I can’t help glancing at Spock every time this happens, just to make sure we’re different people. And he’s watching me. Again. The first times, he withdrew when our eyes met, feigning some renewed interest on his consoles. Not anymore. He returns my gaze. _He knows_. Somehow.

Other days it’s a sort of waking dream somewhere between sleep and consciousness. I fall out of my body. I see another self through another’s eyes. I become that other Jim through the vestiges of many mind melds between them. Between us. And then my soul slams back into my body and I wake with a start, not of panic, only almost of surprise at feeling like _myself_ again.

I was born in space. No ground beneath my feet. Only darkness, silence, cold. If you tune certain subspace frequencies, you pick up this white noise that’s supposed to be residual energy from the Big Bang. The sound of the Universe being born.

My white noise is the sound of my father dying. Sacrificing himself to save everyone. To save me.

How do I respond to that? How do I _compete_ with that? No one ever could. Mom might as well have hung a “decommissioned” sign over her heart. Yeah, she married some jerk and dumped me and Sam in Iowa, ran back to Starfleet as fast as she could. Away from us. Sure, I have mommy issues. And daddy issues. And come to think of it, Whole Damn Universe Issues. Of all the places in the galaxy, this Nero guy pops out of a black hole just in time to blow up the Kelvin and screw up my life. Or so that other Spock told me.

I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry at the thought of this other me. This other Jim person born on a farm, whose father lived to see him become Captain of Enterprise. And damn, he still couldn’t get away from Iowa.

_Can you see me now? Are you proud?_

I’ve always been all over the place. I never gave a damn. I didn’t even take Starfleet seriously. Not even when Spock drilled me on that Kobayashi Maru thing in front of everybody. Not even when we dropped out of warp into a sea of debris and floating bodies of people I had been pestering in the cantina just the day before. Not until the moment I saw a planet collapse like a paper bag being crumbled by some giant hand.

Gives you some perspective, doesn’t it? Spock loses his whole goddamn planet and I’m whining that Nero killed my daddy.

The bottom line is, so we were all shiny and happy in this other fairytale alternate universe. And now we’re all fucked up. But still I keep going back to that otherworldly feel, to that man who was and wasn’t me. All that he was, is it in me too? All that he accomplished, can I do it too? I can see him in an Admiral’s uniform. I can see him touching my hand, _Spock’s hand_ , and there’s a glass panel between us and the agony in his eyes almost _almost_ makes me wanna be Vulcan so I won’t feel like that, whatever _that_ was. Because I thought I knew pain, but clearly I don’t. I thought I’d insulated myself against it so I wouldn’t become a walking wounded like Mom. But clearly I didn’t.

Their friendship. _Our_ friendship? The word is so feeble in face of that bond. The other Spock… he hid things from me, I know it. And that’s fine because I don’t think I really want to know. But there was no hiding his overwhelming joy at meeting me again, that torrent of emotion flowing through the meld. It was exhilarating. It was terrifying. Like a desert riverbed long dry that suddenly overflows after a thunderstorm. The path was there already. I had felt like that _beforenowtomorrow_. In another life.

Will I feel it again?

Pointy-eared bastard. _Both_ of them.

Shit, I’m getting delusions of grandeur and that’s that. Days ago I was a third year cadet about to get kicked out of the Academy. Now I’m Captain of Starfleet’s new flagship. No risk of getting too big for my britches, then. No risk at all.

I was aimless before, wandering. Now the memory of another Jim Kirk is my anchor. It grounds me and whispers I am meant to be part of something. I look around the bridge, and it’s strange to feel so reassured just by watching them all go about their duties. This is where we all belong, where I belong. Provided I don’t screw it up along the way.

“Captain?”

Spock’s voice startles me and I turn to face him. For a moment, I see clearly this gesture from the perspective of another Spock, I see another Jim turning to him with warmth and confidence in his eyes. And I know, without knowing, that same look is on my face right now.


End file.
